# Inexplicably Stupid Restaurant Concepts **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 11, 2017, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245 "2017-04-11T16:50:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Asuka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@Asuka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Asuka)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 5:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/101 "2017-04-15T05:58:29Z")
There’s a local “Irish Pub and Restaurant” except I’m positive they only added the “And Restaurant” part to trick people to come in because it looks like a normal bar except in the corner there’s two tables with two chairs each while everything else is normal barstool seating (and ironically enough you can’t eat at the actual bar) I once got some food from there to-go because I was curious and it tasted like generic over-sauced barfood except way more expensive, like five chicken wings for $9. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 7:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/102 "2017-04-15T07:26:00Z")
They might not be trying to make money on the restaurant part. It might be easier in some places to get an alcohol license if you also sell food. ---
**Author:** ![Dr.Strangelove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dr.strangelove/32/6613_2.png) [@Dr.Strangelove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dr.Strangelove)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 10:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/103 "2017-04-15T10:13:08Z")
> [@Gyrate](#): > > They are indeed. Mostly I blame hipster-types for trying to be all clever and edgy in their eschewing of plates. Where I have encountered it, it is generally impractical, messy and annoying. Some of those are pretty ridiculous, but I don’t think we can blame it all on hipsters. Decades ago, I ate at a truck stop restaurant called Iron Skillet. _Everything_ was served on an iron skillet. This included, for instance, the salad bar, where you had to carry an ice-cold skillet by the handle as you piled stuff on it, trying not to tip it laterally. I’m pretty sure I lost a few cherry tomatoes. ---
**Author:** ![DummyGladHands](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/49beb7/32.png) [@DummyGladHands](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DummyGladHands)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/104 "2017-04-15T13:57:40Z")
Ugh, Melting Pot. Got sick as dog there from cross contamination. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/105 "2017-04-15T14:07:15Z")
> [@Ann\_Hedonia](#): > > Oh, I love The Melting Pot as an occasional thing… And it’s really expensive. It takes me by surprise every time. Insanely so, given that the kitchen does little besides prep. ---
**Author:** ![Pantastic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Pantastic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pantastic)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/106 "2017-04-15T14:17:27Z")
> [@Asuka](#): > > There’s a local “Irish Pub and Restaurant” except I’m positive they only added the “And Restaurant” part to trick people to come in because it looks like a normal bar except in the corner there’s two tables with two chairs each while everything else is normal barstool seating (and ironically enough you can’t eat at the actual bar) I once got some food from there to-go because I was curious and it tasted like generic over-sauced barfood except way more expensive, like five chicken wings for $9. How do the local alcohol laws work where the restaurant is? In a lot of areas, it can be hard to get a ‘bar’ license but easy to get a ‘restaurant’ license to serve alcohol, and they may just be doing the bare minimum to be technically a restaurant. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/107 "2017-04-15T15:14:37Z")
This might not qualify but I disliked most of the theme restaurants that starting popping up in the 1990s. Theme restaurants weren’t exactly new, Showbiz Pizza was started in the 70s for example, but in the 1990s they seemed to be everywhere with restaurants like The Rainforest Cafe, Planet Hollywood, The Jekyll & Hyde Club, etc., etc. And they were all pretty bad. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/108 "2017-04-15T15:24:24Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > This might not qualify but I disliked most of the theme restaurants that starting popping up in the 1990s. Theme restaurants weren’t exactly new, Showbiz Pizza was started in the 70s for example, but in the 1990s they seemed to be everywhere with restaurants like The Rainforest Cafe, Planet Hollywood, The Jekyll & Hyde Club, etc., etc. And they were all pretty bad. Manhattan had the kid-themed _Mars 2112_, which was a hoot to visit but like most of these, had pretty indifferent food. I found it amusing that they had some KILLER cocktails and mixed drinks for Mummy and Daddums. I do have an idea for a really badass theme restaurant, but I’m wise enough to know I can’t do more than write a check for someone who knows what they’re doing. I’ve been the cook for a very large family for a long time, and I understand how I could fool myself into believing that’s enough to run a restaurant… but learned better without making the big, expensive mistake. ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/109 "2017-04-15T15:36:24Z")
Did anybody else notice that, right after 9-11, McDonalds stopped offering serrated plastic knives with carry-out meals, so terrorists could not pull up at the drive=through window on their way to the airport? After that, the plastic knives just had straight edges, unsuitable for cutting throats of flight attendants. ---
**Author:** ![Ann\_Hedonia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ann_hedonia/32/319_2.png) [@Ann\_Hedonia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ann_Hedonia)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/110 "2017-04-15T15:40:32Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > This might not qualify but I disliked most of the theme restaurants that starting popping up in the 1990s. Theme restaurants weren’t exactly new, Showbiz Pizza was started in the 70s for example, but in the 1990s they seemed to be everywhere with restaurants like The Rainforest Cafe, Planet Hollywood, The Jekyll & Hyde Club, etc., etc. And they were all pretty bad. The original Jekyll and Hyde Club was awesome, upon entering it at first felt like one of those ubiquitous places that hung antique crap everywhere, the spookiness and the nature of the decor snuck up on you. But then they had to keep making it “bigger and better” until it was so obvious and overblown that it was just another tourist trap. ---
**Author:** ![Ann\_Hedonia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ann_hedonia/32/319_2.png) [@Ann\_Hedonia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ann_Hedonia)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/111 "2017-04-15T15:45:14Z")
> [@jtur88](#): > > Did anybody else notice that, right after 9-11, McDonalds stopped offering serrated plastic knives with carry-out meals, so terrorists could not pull up at the drive=through window on their way to the airport? After that, the plastic knives just had straight edges, unsuitable for cutting throats of flight attendants. I’m old enough to remember them changing their coffee stirrers from a long handled mini-spoon design to a long handled flat blade stirrer. This was allegedly done because the spoons were being widely used as cocaine paraphernalia. > **[Did Cocaine Users Cause McDonald's to Replace Their Coffee Spoons?](https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/stirring-response/)** > > Businesses are not well served when their products are associated with illegal activities. ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/112 "2017-04-15T20:25:16Z")
> [@Reno\_Nevada](#): > > The hell? What kind of crawfish dish were you eating, and what kind of utensil were you using? Crawfish Alfredo at Red Lobster or something? > > Crawfish New Orleans style is pretty much guaranteed to be boiled whole in spices along with potatoes and corn. The corn will be left with a coating of spices, which includes a lot of red pepper. You crack the crawfish with your bare hands. It is a huge mess and takes a long time to eat. > [@Jackmannii](#): > > One of my favorites is the crawfish platter at Pappadeaux (typically comes with fried crawfish and crawfish etoufee, pictured [here](https://randomlyedible.com/2014/04/07/pappadeaux-see-food-and-eat-it/). Given the amount of meat in a crawfish, I don’t want to waste time dissecting them en masse. I’ll happily pay someone else to do it for me. There are two kinds of Cajun fare. One is prepared dishes like etouffee, or fried crawfish. The other kind is the crawfish boil, which is as described - whole crawfish boiled, typically in a bunch of spices with corn and potatoes. You peel and eat by hand. That’s the way it’s done. Crawfish boils are real popular along the Gulf coast. > [@BeeGee](#): > > I’m guessing you wouldn’t care for Joe’s on Tybee Island that has both feral cats and alligators. > [@Jackmannii](#): > > Alligator, OK. I’m not into the idea of eating feral cats. Grrr, ninja’d. “Are either of those easier to peel and eat than crawfish?” > [@Chronos](#): > > _Every_ restaurant is built on “that one corner”. The location isn’t special; the business is. Running a restaurant successfully is a lot harder than most people think, and requires a very different skill set, with the result that most restaurants fail very quickly. So you get one place open up somewhere, and unsurprisingly, it fails. It’s followed by another, and another, and unsurprisingly, they fail too. Eventually, if the place isn’t torn down, you get management in who has the knack for business, and you get a restaurant that sticks around for decades. Until the owner retires, and then the cycle starts again. While it is true that many restaurant ventures fail for a variety of reasons that often boil down to poor management, there are some locations that are not as supportive as others. For instance, in suburbs where different polities are mushed together such that the borders are indistinguishable, you can have differing tax rates on streets a mile apart. Or parking can be nonexistent in an area where foot traffic is not high. > [@hogarth](#): > > [Poop Cafe, Toronto’s first toilet-themed dessert restaurant](http://www.blogto.com/eat_drink/2016/10/toronto_goes_wild_for_grand_opening_of_the_poop_cafe/) > > Nuff said. _shudder_ WTF? > [@Musicat](#): > > I don’t know if they still exist, but in LA there was a chain called “Mongolian BBQ” where you selected the oriental-style ingredients yourself, put them in a bowl, then gave the bowl to the chef, who stir-fried them on a large, circular grill. Not only is that a thing, there are now chain versions, like Genghis Grill and Gobi Mongolian. Back in Clear Lake, long before the chain fad there was a mom and pop that had good Mongolian BBQ, my first introduction to the concept. It was open for two decades (or longer), but then the old man retired and handed it over to his son, and between that and the spring up of the new chains, they went out of business. Too bad - I liked them for the variety difference from Genghis Grill, which I also like. > [@WolfpackJeep](#): > > I ate at a Genghis Grill at Charlotte-Douglas once. It was the same concept described here for a Mongolian Grill, except you just ordered and they put pre-portioned food on the rotating grill. It was pretty decent…Yelp tells me it’s closed now though. That doesn’t sound like the Genghis Grill I have patronized. ---
**Author:** ![E-DUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/e-dub/32/403_2.png) [@E-DUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/E-DUB)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/113 "2017-04-15T22:59:58Z")
No one’s mentioned the “Frog and Peach”? Just for grins. ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/114 "2017-04-15T23:18:27Z")
Got a call from my daughter in Manhattan this afternoon. She was waiting in line to get into [this place.](https://www.cookiedonyc.com/cookie-dough-confections) Fuckin’ hipsters. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [April 15, 2017, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/115 "2017-04-15T23:36:22Z")
> [@kaylasdad99](#): > > Got a call from my daughter in Manhattan this afternoon. She was waiting in line to get into [this place.](https://www.cookiedonyc.com/cookie-dough-confections) > > Fuckin’ hipsters. Waiting in line for 4 + hours?!?:eek: ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2017, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/116 "2017-04-16T00:10:39Z")
Actually, her wait was closer to 30 minutes. She called because she wanted someone to talk with and pass the time. In fact, I was her _second_ choice. ---
**Author:** ![bmoak](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/9dc877/32.png) [@bmoak](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bmoak)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2017, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/117 "2017-04-17T02:26:25Z")
> [@Rick\_Kitchen](#): > > Christina Tosi, one of the supposed judges on Master Chef USA, runs a “restaurant” called Milk Bar. She serves such delicacies as “[cereal milk](http://milkbarstore.com/main/menu/recipes-and-how-tos/)”. Why so snarky? Christina Tosi is a pastry chef. Milk Bar is a bakery. It sells cookies, cakes, pies and a few savory stuffed breads. Is it really odd for (an admittedly quirky) bakery to sell drinks that go with those things? The cereal milk is also used as a base for ice cream and shakes. My NYC contribution to this thread is [Rice to Riches](https://www.ricetoriches.com/), a place that only sells rice pudding in many different varieties. It’s been open for several years. ---
**Author:** ![Rick\_Kitchen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rick_kitchen/32/522_2.png) [@Rick\_Kitchen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick_Kitchen)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2017, 3:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/118 "2017-04-17T03:16:47Z")
> [@](#): > > Why so snarky? Christina Tosi is a pastry chef. Milk Bar is a bakery. It sells cookies, cakes, pies and a few savory stuffed breads. Is it really odd for (an admittedly quirky) bakery to sell drinks that go with those things? The cereal milk is also used as a base for ice cream and shakes. Because she pretends to be a gourmet chef who bloviates as a judge. ---
**Author:** ![Quint](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/76d3ee/32.png) [@Quint](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quint)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2017, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/119 "2017-04-17T05:19:23Z")
> [@Gyrate](#): > > There’s a particular [item](http://wewantplates.com/2017/01/dessert-on-a-sanitary-towel/)that made me somewhat queasy just looking at it. That is insane. ---
**Author:** ![Quint](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/76d3ee/32.png) [@Quint](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quint)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2017, 5:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245/120 "2017-04-17T05:38:45Z")
> [@Shoeless](#): > > A guy I used to work with had the same problem. He never could get the local Chinese place to make his food spicy enough, even when he said to make it as hot as they could. It’s like they were afraid they were going to hurt him. > > So one day when he asked them to make it as hot as possible, he added “Nuclear.” It was like the light bulb finally came on. > > So they brought his lunch, and as he was eating it his nose was running and sweat was pouring down his forehead. The waitress timidly walked up and asked “Is it OK?” And he grinned and gave her a big thumbs-up. My buddy tells a similar story. Every time he would eat in the Chinese place by his work he would ask for super spicy. No matter how often he asked for as spicy as they could, it was always a letdown. So one day he asks for it “spicy like you would make it spicy for yourself”. He takes one bite and his head started sweating- finally spicy heaven! The waiter came up to him and said “Today the food is free- you pay for the water!!” to big laughs all around. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/inexplicably-stupid-restaurant-concepts/784245.md?page=7)